# K programming language

Hacker Approved page: https://hackerapproved.com/p/k-programming-language/

6 people recommended K programming language in Hacker News comments, 8 had mixed feelings and 6 criticized it, November 2025 to October 2026. It was recommended in 5 of 12 months, in 5 threads. It does not meet the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** Terse array language that people recommend for powerful, high-level code; the main caveat is cryptic symbols that are hard to read and type.

Summary written by Claude from 14 comments.

## Why people recommend it

- Impressive results from high-level abstraction (2 comments in the sample): "there really is something compelling to this sort of lifting of iterator at a time fiddling to a higher level of abstraction" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46770207)) "that k lang to me looks like an obfuscated code contest entry but the results are impressive" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47494706))

## What people warn about

- Cryptic, write-only code (3 comments in the sample): "Super terse and powerful. Pretty much write-only." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48241793)) "it's very hard and often cryptic to read" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47715896)) "Generally considered write-only" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48822945))
- Hard-to-type non-standard symbols (2 comments in the sample): "I strongly dislike this choice of using all the symbols that do not exist on normal keyboards." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46713177)) "Personally I find the custom symbols of APL and BQN to be easier to type and read than the ASCII of J and K." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46713918))

## Other array programming languages people recommend

- [J programming language](https://hackerapproved.com/p/j-programming-language/): 20 recommend, 9 mixed, 10 criticize
- [Uiua](https://hackerapproved.com/p/uiua/): 15 recommend, 3 mixed, 3 criticize
- [BQN](https://hackerapproved.com/p/bqn/): 8 recommend, 2 mixed, 2 criticize
- [kdb+ q](https://hackerapproved.com/p/q/): 5 recommend, 1 mixed, 1 criticize

## The badge

A product earns the Hacker Approved badge when at least 10 people recommend it, recommenders outnumber critics at least 2 to 1 (mixed feelings count toward neither side), it was recommended in at least 4 of the 12 months and in at least 5 different threads, and no single thread supplies more than half of the people who recommend it. Health and money products are never badged.

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "K programming language", https://hackerapproved.com/p/k-programming-language/ (6 recommend, 8 mixed, 6 criticize; Hacker News comments, November 2025 to October 2026).

Counts updated 2 Nov 2026, with data through October 31, 2026.